Conflicted Feelings
by SomeGuy1990
Summary: Marco begins to realize some new inconvenient feelings for his best friend, but a reckless dumb decision by Star might just change everything forever.
1. Reunion

**Conflicted Feelings**

Chapter 1 – Reunion

"So, guys, all ready?" he asked in an eager tone to his companions in the room. Marco was standing in his room with Jackie and Janna, who both gave a thumbs up of approval with deliberately intense expressions. He chuckled and continued:

"Okay, then. Star must be expecting us in aproximatedly three minutes..." he said, scissors in hand, eyes on his clock as if counting tempo to strike a decisive move.

"Uuuuurghh!... Do you think Star Butterfly is sitting tight waiting for the scheduled time?!" an incredulous Janna protested. "You may have talked to her during summer but she hasn't seen me or Jackie for over a month now. She's probably burning the place down in excitement right now!"

"But..." Marco started to argue but Jackie cut him:

"Dude, Janna's right, you know. What does it matter getting there a little early?" she squeezed his hand and gave a smile he could feel himself melting with. "Besides, you may not notice, but you're not the only one who cares about her."

He stared caringly at her warm smile, considering for the first time how much the two girls grew attached to Star and gazed at Janna who had a way too serious expression on and said:

"She's burning that place down, Marco, she needs her banana fix. I'm her Janna Banana, Marco, let me save them."

It was with a warm feeling in his chest that he conceded.

"Fine, let's go."

With a gracious swipe, the scissors tore open the fabric of reality revealing a bright blue portal in the air. The three stepped through it and were instantly at the castle throne room.

Janna and Jackie were in mid-oooohhh when a loud shriek of excitement pierced the air and a fraction of second later a pink and yellow blurr tackled the three of them to the ground.

"Oh my God, you're here you're here you're here, you're really here!" Star, in her full proper princess indumentary complete with beehive hairdo, just bolted from her parents' side hitting them full speed and was currently squeezing them in a big hug under the unimpressed gaze of the king and queen.

"Manners, sweetie." Queen Moon reminded in a defeated tone.

"Yea yea yea, I know, I know." Star managed to recompose herself and help her friends up. She still had a huge grin of joy and seemed to be holding herself to not start jumping in place as she took a better look at her guests and spoke to her parentes. "Hun-hun, mom and dad, meet our guests: Jackie Lynn Thomas, Janna Ordonia and you already know Marco Diaz, of course..."

As Star spoke Marco was looking at her. A strange, warm feeling spreading in his chest as he realized her joyful excited self was back to normal after the rough ride that was the Toffee crisis. He didn't have the time to stop and think about what a void she left in his life when she went back to Mewni and seeing her happy and eager like this felt like order was back to the world.

With these thoughts and a growing smile on his face he admired her as the warmness in his chest spread across his body and his breathing felt lighter.

"Marco!"

"What? What happened?!" he jumped, startled.

"I said are you ready for the. Best. Day. Evar?" Star asked smiling from ear to ear with one arm over Jackie's shoulder and the other over Janna's. The king and queen were already gone.

"Am I?!" he replied excitedly, striking karate poses "What are we gonna do anyway?"

"We better be in for something hardcore!" Janna exclaimed. Star put one hand on each of her shoulders, stared at her in the face and said in a too serious of a tone to be taken seriously:

"Janna Banana, I promise that to you and more."

"Cooool." was her response. Jackie jumped in:

"Come on, Star, fill us in the plans!"

Star took both Jackie's hands in hers and asked:

"Jackie, ever been on a little something called "Warnicorn Race"?" Jackie stared back and replied:

\- Dude, this sounds metal...

It sounded somewhat risky to Marco but he was in to see Star happy. He approached her to finnaly have a real talk with his best friend, but she dodged him and grabed the other two guiding them into the castle and saying:

"So, Marco, you already know everything around here, right? So just meet us at the racing track outdoors, okay?"

"Um, okay... So I meet you... there..." he responded, mostly to himself since they were already gone.

"Okay, that's weird..." he thought. "I'll ask her about this later.".

 **A/N: Wow, can't believe I'm writing this! My first ever fanfic. :D I'll finish this regardless but, you know, feedback is welcome. Even on grammar and spelling, since english isn't my first language. I tried to staty true to the spirit of the show and the characters, hope I succeeded. Chapter 2 will be up soon.**


	2. Best Day Ever?

**Conflicted Feelings**

Chapter 2 – Best Day Ever?...

Star had just sent Jackie and Janna to the racing track and was now changing clothes in her room.

She goofily struggled her way out of the formal dress and tossed it aside with an exaggerated sigh of relief. Star walked to her wardrobe to get a more fitting dress for a warnicorn race but noticed her reflection on a big mirror on the wall and stoped to admire it a little. She looked herself up and down, made poses and overall examined her body with attention. Her wings grew quite a lot in the last month, a little more and she'll soon be able to fly like her mom. She also proudly noticed her figure was rapidly developing some modest curves "Nothing close to Jackie's, tho" the thought put a frown over her smile. "Did Marco notice? Would he be into me if I was more like her?", this definetely put an end to her good mood.

Star grabbed her wand, now whole again, and looked at it remembering the hope it gave her that everythng could go back to normal in the end. She despised feeling like this and being unable to control it. She honestly thought everything was normalized with Marco after the whole Toffee crufuffle but today she once again felt the spark in her heart and the butterflies in her stomach... and that bitter envy of Jackie.

"NO! Nonononono No!" she stood up fully decided, talking to herself in her "official" tone "Star Butterfly, you're a strong, proud mewnian princess, you're gonna sort out this "bestie passion" stuff and you're gonna survive it! Now you better put on some clothes, a positive atitude and give your friends the. Best. Day. Evar!"

Star hopped in a casual dress, put her hair down, topped it with her crown and mentaly braced herself for any demonstrations of affection Marco and Jackie might share.

She headed for the racing track with steely resolve and spotted the three guests by the fence watching soldiers on warnicorn back training. Janna was just resting her elbows on the fence looking cool with a suspiciously larger backpack than on arrival, Jackie had her head on Marco's shoulder and seemed to be whispering something amusing to him, who was laughing with his arm around her waist, pulling her close.

"Well, we're off to a good start.", she thought. Star came near and caught their attention:

"He-ey, who's ready for some action?"

"Finnaly!" Janna proclaimed, already climbing the fence. Marco jumped in:

"Wait! Star... are you sure this is a racing track?" he pointed to the enclosure which looked like a ravaged battlefield more than anything else, holes on the ground, smoke, broken armors and weapons littered the place. In the middle rose a hill with a chess patterned triangular flag on a pole.

"Pfft... silly, warnicorn race is a war and a race! You must break the wild will of your warnicorn and guide it to the top of the hill. Whoever gets there first wins!" Janna and Jackie had a bright in their eyes as if christmas had come early this year.

"Let's go!" they both said, jumping the fence.

"Yasss!" Star followed.

"Wait, Star, can I get some protection?!" Matco yelled behind.

"Oh, Marco, you stupid sexy dork you..." Star thought with a sigh in her chest which almost immediately turned to guilt.

"Sure, check out the armory!" she screamed over her shoulder. Marco seemed somewhat disappointed and it weighed on her heart. She desperately wanted to be with him and yet it felt bad, but also good. It took all of her spirit to maintain her facade and to not scream her lungs out and blow stuff up.

The warnicorn race went on as good as one would expect: chaos, rules made up on the fly and Janna with a shiny new scar to boast about. Marco tried to speak to Star afterwards, she talked to him briefly about something tottaly unrelated with whatever he actually wanted to talk about in a tone she hoped would sound normal then rushed them to the flying cloud tour.

Through the day, form the cloud tour to the combat training with the soldiers to the archery course, Star spoke to Marco only the strictly necessary trying to sound natural while being torn apart between her needs and her guilt. She must have been failing miserably, 'cause Marco wasn't even caring to keep up with them anymore.

On the way to dinner Star was chating happily with Jackie and Janna when they noticed Marco was getting behind, hands in his pockets, head hanging looking at the ground.

Star tried all day to avoid and drown these feelings, but seeing him like this sparked them like a gas truck. Her heart sunk, her eyes stung and she just had to do something about it speaking to him with sincerity for the first time today:

"Marco..."

"Marco, what's wrong? Are you okay?" Jackie hurried to his side caressing his face, a worried look on hers.

Star watched the whole scene as if out of her body, the warm looks they shared as they talked, the gentle kisses every pause they had, the deep kiss in the end. With teary eys and no breathing at all Star felt a hand on her shoulder and a voice said:

"Star, girl, be strong now." Janna looked at her a concerned face. "I know how it is..."

Star gulped the cry and cleaned the tears off her eyes just in time to see Marco and Jackie closing by.

"Hey, Star, may we have a talk?" Jackie said "You guys can go on ahead, we'll meet you there for dinner."

Janna and Marco went through the hall, leaving Star and Jackie alone.

"Star, be honest with me." Jackie said with a gentle hand on her shoulder "Are you mad with Marco for some reason?"

"What?! No! Why would I..." Star replied, genuinely shocked.

"Well, the whole day it looked like you were trying to shoo him off or something. We all noticed, specially him. He's pretty bad about it too. You hurt him."

And this hurt Star, who could only look down.

Jackie waited for na answer that never came. She studied Star for a moment and continued:

"This... doesn't have anything to do with that... crush thing, does it?"

"Pfffffft!... Nooooooo no, no, no, of course not... What?! No, no, nothing about that at all, heh heh heh..." she dismissed painfully and awkwardly but soon realized Jackie wasn't buying any of that so the act dropped and she went on a desperate rambling "Oh, Jackie, I'm so sorry! I just started having these feelings for him and I thought it was all back to normal but it wasn't but I want it to be as it used to but what if it never do and I lose him and..."

"Dude, dude, calm down." Jackie took her hands on hers as Star began hyper ventilating. "It's okay, it's alright, Star. No one can control the heart, dude. You don't have to be guilty or ashamed or whatever. Andy ou don't have to suffer this alone, too. It'll only hurt you and will hurt him too." she finished, offering a comforting smile.

Star looked back at Jackie with wide eyes, relieved by having someone to talk about it without judgement. She finnaly felt she could realistically deal with this problem.

"Oh thank you, Jackie, thank you..." Star had tears in her eyes again. "Guess I understand why he likes you so much."

"Well, now you gotta talk to him about, right? Is he not your best friend? Go straight things up. He'll listen to you."

Star held her head high and felt lighter than she had felt in weeks.

"I will."

 **A/N: Phew, this was a tough one. –o- I felt we needed a little context on what's going on in Star's head to fully appreciate the next one, when things get *heated* ;) Anyway, we'll be back to Marco on the next chapter and it might be the final chapter, not sure yet.**

 **Remember any feedback is always welcome, love y'all peeps.**


	3. No Turning Back

**Conflicted Feelings**

Chapter 3 – No Turning Back

The dinner went weirdly uneventful and awkward.

Marco was musing about how such na uplifting feeling by the morning could simply turn into a clenched fist on his heart by the night. He didn't even notice Star intensely staring at him the whole night, unusually serious. The lack of her energetic atitude guaranteed a never before seen peace at the dinner table, so the dialogue consisted mostly of smal talk of Jana and Jackie with the king and queen.

Right now Marco was sitting in his luxurious guest room, his mind rushing. It was hard to breathe as he repassed the day in his head.

He felt a bright feeling on his chest when they reunited with Star this morning, he assumed it was just excitement and the hope he could finnaly have his best friend back by his side. But it didn't go like that at all. Star avoided him all day and the bright in his chest slowly turned into an annoying needle in his heart, aching with every breath. By the end of the day the pain had turned into a cold void of suffering, to the point he didn't even know what it was anymore. He only knew it was something different, it confused him... and scared him.

It scared him that Jackie standing by his side didn't seem to affect it. Usually just being with her made him feel immortal, but now even with her support he felt somewhat incomplete.

He just had to talk to Star... "Star." He passed a hand over his face and through his hair in frustration. Things were not as they used to, that was crystal clear now. If anything they were changing even further and that was the scariest thought of all.

A knock-knock on the door.

"Marco, I'm sorry for today... I didn't mean to... well, guess you know what I mean. We reeeeealy have a lot to talk." Star called in a cautious, vulnerable tone. Marco jumped to the door, eager to talk things straight with her and for some other reason he couldn't quite put his finger on.

He opened the door and started talking in na annoyed tone:

"Finnaly, Star! What the heck was going on today?..." when he saw her standing there with her hands held together in front of her and a needy, desolate look in her eyes, something in his heart told him he couldn't possibly be mad at her. "Star, do you want to come in?" he asked with concern.

She entered the room and turned to look at him as he was closing the door. They both stood silent for a moment, looking at each other. For the first time Marco noticed how blue her eyes were and what a nice contrast they made with her blonde hair framing her face with the pink hearts. After all the suffering of the day he felt he could breathe. Standing there with her made him feel whole for the first time today and Marco realized she didn't have to explain anything.

"Star, look..." he started but was interrupted when she embraced him in the most heartfelt hug they ever shared.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry Marco! I didn't mean to shut you out today. I just..." her voice started cracking "I just thought it could be like it used to but I... but I... couldn't... Oh, Marco, this scares me!"

"Star, you don't have to say anything." he said, leaving her embrace to look at her pained expression..

"But I want to! I should have noticed, Jackie shouldn't have to..."

"Star, it scares me too." he silenced her, thinking of Jackie now felt confusing and he had his share of displeasure for the day. "Something feels different... But you're not alone, you won't ever be alone, you can be sure 'cause I'm not going anywhere."

The warm feeling again spread from his chest to his whole body, he held one of her hands and they shared a brief look that seemed to take na eternity.

Marco drew in every detail of her face as it lighted up with a spark of hope and a small smile. It felt like a long time, but it probably didn't last long because a fraction of a moment later Star went forward and locked their lips together.

He felt all of her warmness come to him, her scent, her touch was intoxicating and before anyone could make sense of what was going on they were making out. Passionetly.

Star tasted of sun and strawberry, their tongues uncoordinatley explored each other's mouths. She had her arms around his neck, his hands explored her waist and back earning moans of approval, their lips caressed each other inbetween deeper and deeper kisses and their sparing breaths, gulpin on each other like water in a cruel drought, and the world had drifted away and all that existed was one another and their panting and moaning. Marco felt immortal.

Carried away, he trailed kisses down her neck, drawing in as much of her scent as he could without exploding. Right at this moment he felt a lustful whisper in his ear:

"Unrfh... Marco..."

And it dawned on him it was Star's voice. He was making out with Star. His goofy, adorable best friend Star Butterfly. Then he thought of Jackie. "This has to stop", he thought.

He tried to break away but Star still had her arms around his neck and was stronger than she looked like. He struggled.

"Shtarr..."

"Mhfrco..."

"Star!" they managed to break apart.

They were both panting and flustered, trying to catch their breaths. Marco noticed they were almost falling on the bed and mentaly sighed in relief for stopping on time for he had no idea how far things could go there.

They stared at each other. On the moment they broke apart Marco could see confusion and hurt in Star's eyes, then surprise at the realization of what just happened, the dread at the implications and she started:

"Oh my God I'm sorry Marco! I-I... I don't know what got into me... I couldn't... I wouldn't... I... I..." despair took her features and she continued in a higher pitch, art the brink of tears "I really messed this one up, didn't I? Screwed things forever with you... with Jackie... I..."

Marco just wanted to embrace her, cover her face with kisses, whisper in her ear that he would never leave, that she should never cry... but he was still dumbfounded so all he could do was stare as she teared up.

When she turned to leave Marco found his voice:

"No, you're not doing this to me again!" he said, holding her arm so she would stay. "Don't you dare leaving me like this!"

Star looked at him surprised, cleaning the tears off her eyes.

"Star, things have changed between us. It may never come back to what it was. I'm... having some... weird feelings about you. And there's Jackie... What I mean is I don't know what's gonna happen. But this change... it doesn't have to be something bad! I'm your best friend and I said I'm gonna be by your side always and I mean it. Don't ever be afraid to lose me and you better not try to run away from me! Please?..." he said, standing awkwardly, trying to hide the the hardest erection he ever had.

Star finnaly cracked and started sobbing on his chest while he held her near.

"Why did things had to turn out likethis?!" she cried out all of her pain and frustrations that night.

On the way out by the door Star stopped, looked him right in the eye and said firmly and serenely with a small smile on her lips:

"I love you, Marco."

Marco felt his heart Racing. Raised one hand and caressed her cheek.

"Good night, Star."

 **A/N: THE THIRST IS REAL! :D**

 **Oh, my poor babies, so inexperienced on the matters of love. ;-; Don't worry, kids, it gets better with time.**

 **So, I'm thinking of making one last wrap up chapter. I wonder how someone as confident and chill as Jackie would react to her special person might have feelings for someone else. :3**


	4. Epilogue

**Conflicted Feelings**

Chapter 4 – Epilogue

The next day Star insisted they had another hang out, since the last one didn't go so well. Marco was glad to see she finnaly seemed in peace with her emotions, which mostly meant chãos and randomness. Marco noticed she was policing herself to not get too physical with him, though, and he was thankful for this, his feelings about her were still a swirling mess of uncertainty. And there was Jackie.

During the whole day guilt gnawed on his mind regarding last night's "incident", as he liked to think about it, especially when Jackie would come and start chatting random stuff with him, always with a caring hug or hand caress. Despite his newfound affections for Star, his feelings for Jackie were still running strong. He felt divided and he hated it.

Star also seemed to be trying not to be in the same place as he and Jackie at the same time. Guess seeing him being intimate with another girl was still a little more than what she could handle.

The day was almost over when the group arrived at their final stop: shieldsurfing down a huge grassy hill. They had just climbed the thing when Star began rushing them:

"Come on, now, everybody take a shield and go sliding down the hill!" she said, already with a big broad shield over her head and walking to the declive.

"Wait, Star..." Marco was still catching his breath from the climb and the extenuous day. "Can't we take a break here? Admire the sunset?"

"Breaks are for the weak, Marco!" she exclaimed dramatically as she jumped on the shield and started sliding down with a gleeeful scream.

"Damn right, girl!" Janna followed right away;

Marco stood on top of the hill looking Star go down and wondering if that girl ever run out of energy. A warm smile on his face and light breathing in his chest.

Jackie approached him:

"Hey, I'm glad you two are getting along again." Jackie said with a satisfied smile as she held his hand.

"Yeah,.. everything is just fine again." Marco uneasily replied, trying to sound natural. Jackie caught on it though:

"Marco, did something happen?" she asked curiously.

For a second, Marco considered denying it, but he couldn't handle the guilt in his mind whenever he looked at her smile any longer. She deserved sincerity. He sighed:

"Well, something did happen. Last night we were talking and suddenly... well, we kissed." he thought it was best to spare her the details. "I'll understand if you won't ever wanna see me again." he finished with resigned defeat in his voice, his head hanging, giving Jackie a side look.

Jackie was staring at him with wide eyes, her ever present chill smile gone, granting a dumbfounded look to her face as she looked from Marco to Star, downhill, unsure of what to do or say next. Marco's never seen her like that before. Quickly, she tried to recompose herself:

"Uhm... W-Well, it was just a kiss..." she said, putting a hand on his shoulder. Marco decided he wasn't being clear enough:

"No, Jackie, it's not just the kiss I... I'm having some feelings for Star. Deep feelings getting stronger everyday and I don't know what to make of them! And I still love you, Jackie! I feel my brain is burning out. I wish I could turn these feelings off..."

Jackie looked down, putting a strand of hair behind her ear and resting her hand on her neck, visibly hurt by what she just heard. Marco's heart sank at the sight. Seeing her unraveled like this, drenching in herself, her pain, was such a contrast to her usual self he had to do something:

"Jackie?..." he asked with concern.

This startled Jackie, looking at him with surprise as if she had forgotten he was there. Surprise turned to sadness then to resolve in a matter of seconds. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She approached him putting a hand on the side of his face and said:

"Marco... what you feel is what you feel, that's just how the world goesa round. You'll figure these feelings out eventually, just... try not to suffer too much..." she said with a warm smile, a hint of sadness in her eyes. "And what I feel is that I like you,I really like you and I want to be with you... do you still feel the same way?" he could see she was making an effort to be the usual chill, supportive Jackie.

"You always manage to remind me why I love you..." his heart felt lighter and he kissed her. She responded with more passion than usual and when it was done he could feel her cool minty breath in his mouth. She looked at him with a cool smile and whispered in his ear:

"Besides, if you two are really that into each other, maybe we could... you know, invite her to join us. For some... fun times..." the idea made his pants suddenly feel a bit too tight, Jackie looked at him satified with the effects of her words.

"Hey, you guys don't forget to invite me too!" Janna's voice suddenly ringed behind them and Marco jumped like a viper just bit him.

"J-Janna! W-What... H-How much did you hear?!" Marco asked, red as a tomato.

"You'll know in due time, Marco, in due time..." she said with a smug smile. "Anyway, Diaz, Jackie and Star?! Not bad, not bad at all... So, Marco, when will I have some of that honey?" she finished pleased to see she could still get to him.

"Glad to see my pain is a joke for someone!" as red as his hoodie, he took one of the shields and sled down.

After dinner was time for the guests to say good bye. The three of them were standing by the portal with Star, sharing their parting words:

"I'm soooooo happy you guys could come! Janna Banana, I loved how you made that guard cry! You're a natural at the interrogation arts, baby. Don't wait too much to pay another visit!"

"Guilty as charged." Janna put her hands up "And whenever I wanna come, all I have to do is pay Marco a surprise visit." she said, giving Star a tight hug.

Star then proceeded to give Jackie a bear hug of her own. Marco smiled at how much she still valued Jackie's friendship, despite the circumstances.

She then turned to him and embraced tenderly, tip-toeing top ut her head on his shoulder, he was getting taller than her. His head felt light with her scent when she backed off and gently took his hands in hers:

"Marco, would you ask your parents if it's okay for me to use the spare room again when school returns?"

His heart felt golden and a huge smile spread across his face:

"Of course you can, Star! You're family to them!"

They stood like that for some time, sharing a caring stare. A cough blinked them out of it:

"So, dudes, are we going or what?" Jackie asked, by the portal.

"Sure, I'm going!" said Marco, giving Star on last smile before stepping through the portal.

 **A/N: Well, it's over, kids! It was really great to work on this, so I might come back to writing fanfics in the future. :D**

 **Please leave your feedback, if you loved it, if you hated it, if it was just "meh"... just please let me know.**

 **Don't forget to tell anyone you think would enjoy this story to check it out. Tell your friends, your siblings, your spouse(s), your pets.**

 **Tell me you like me. Tell me you love me. TELL ME YOU WANT ME AND WON'T EVER LET ME LEAVE. Ok, not that much, you creeps. ._.**


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